


Promises

by Valmouth



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: F/M, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, M/M, Pining, Promises, Trust
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-22
Updated: 2012-08-22
Packaged: 2017-11-12 16:04:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/493091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Valmouth/pseuds/Valmouth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He’d gotten involved, like an idiot, and things were personal, fine, and he cared, okay, but he wasn’t going to trust these people. Not an inch. He was going to do his job, and he’d make the sacrifices that had to be made, but hell if he was going to let them get too close.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Promises

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I own no rights to this character, or to the other characters, places, events and concepts derived from Stargate: Atlantis. I mean no offence by posting this and make no money from it.

He started out promising himself he wouldn’t get involved in anything serious any more.

He’d paid his dues. He’d flown his missions. He’d been exiled and blacklisted and it had ruined his marriage and his family and all he wanted to do by the end of it was fly his damn chopper and leave the life and death crap to the other guys.

Kind of didn’t work out that way.

He’d tried. Really he had. He’d even flipped a coin so it wouldn’t be his fault but fuck Fate. The only time he asked the universe to let him off the hook, she flipped his coin to perfect tails every time. Ten times in a row! That was a sign, right? Never mind he called heads to go each time.

Anyway. Who was he kidding? Ancient Genes, wormholes, stargates, other planets- he was there with bells on. Or guns, at the very least. Because he wasn’t stupid.

Except he clearly was. Why else would he let himself end up on the worst prepared intergalactic expedition in the history of stupid plans.

He blamed Rodney for that. ‘Think about where we are in the universe’ his ass!

He’d used the Chair. He’d felt it... well, it wasn’t like it hummed in the back of his brain or made his tongue tingle or anything. Just felt pretty damn cool that he was the only one apart from a _General_ who could sit in it and do that.

So he got involved.

But really, he didn’t have to like it. He didn’t have to take it personally.

He didn’t know anything about stargates and off-world missions and the Ancients, no matter how many taped lectures of Dr. Jackson’s he got distracted in the middle of. Once by trying to balance his pencil on the end of his nose. That McKay guy had saved him from death by insurmountable boredom with the words, “What’s that? Oh, well, that’s not important. Here. Turn this on.”

Which John was happy to do. It gave him a warm glow of satisfaction and made McKay green with envy. And it wasn’t like it was hard work.

Ford turned out to be a good kid too.

Colonel Sumner was a pain in the ass but John was hardly going to let that stop him. If it hadn’t stopped him for eight years, five in a war zone, it wouldn’t stop him going Alien Hunting.

Nice aliens, though. Well, the Athosians. And okay, maybe he should have listened more during Dr. Jackson’s lectures because by the time the Wraith turned up, he was pretty sure things weren’t going to be as easy as they’d seemed back on Earth.

Not as easy as turning things on by thinking at them.

He could think at Sumner. Could think at Teyla and the Athosians. Could even think at the damn Wraith but that made about as much difference doing nothing. So he ended up having to pick up the real guns- again- and start shooting- again- and watch people die- again.

Even ended up shooting Sumner.

He hadn’t done it for fun, of course, but it had hurt. Went against code to kill one of his own, even if the man wasn’t top of his favourites list. Didn’t matter because Sumner had worn the uniform, and Sumner would have put his life on the line for his men, and John could respect that.

Best thing he could do was make sure the enemy paid for it. Make sure they all learned from it.

Dr. Weir gave him a delicate little pep talk and Teyla touched foreheads with him and Rodney McKay stopped next to him in the middle of chasing the Athosian women to say, “I need you down at the labs tomorrow. I’ve got some things for you to turn on.”

So he was involved, and the universe had funny way of making things personal.

But that was okay. He didn’t have to like these people. Just had to work with them.

That stood about as much chance as a snowball in hell. Or chocolate in a three mile vicinity of Atlantis. Especially once the supplies started running out.

“Well, Colonel Sumner has - _had_ \- allocated gate teams,” Weir said.

“Gate teams?”

“First point of contact teams,” Weir explained.

“Off-world teams,” Ford clarified.

“Oh,” John said, “Those. Wait, weren’t we on one of those when we woke up the Wraith?”

“Yes, sir,” Ford said.

“Right, right,” John said, nodding slowly, “So who’s the primary recon team?”

From the way Weir smiled, he knew he wouldn’t like it. “You are, Major,” she said, “Unless...”

“No,” he said, maybe a shade too quickly, “No, that’s fine. That’s good. I can do that.” He caught Ford’s eye. “Off world?”

Ford grinned. “I’ll show you the ropes, Major.”

And Ford had. Easy ropes, too: go out there and be nice to people. If they’re not polite, suggest a compromise. If they start looking aggressive, leave. If they don’t let you leave, shoot them. John figured he could do that.

“You said you know a lot of planets to trade on, right?” he asked Teyla. When she dipped her head and looked calm but enquiring, he continued with, “So. Wanna be on my team?”

Once she ascertained exactly what that meant, she looked calm but friendly. “I would be happy to be on your team, Major Sheppard.”

“Great,” John said.

To McKay he said, “Tag. You’re on my team,” and left Rodney yelling, “Of course I am, I’m the best scientist you’ve got,” after him.

John suspected the other scientists in the lab probably didn’t appreciate that. Especially that little guy with the glasses who was always muttering something in another language. But fuck it. Most of his soldiers weren’t exactly pleased with him either. The marines were flat out hostile. It wasn’t the same thing, but it was a start. Common Ground, at least.

Something, he figured, to build on.

And oddly enough, it wasn’t hard to tolerate McKay. Not after the personal shield thing. Not when he walked into the lab for morning lightswitch duties to find McKay wearing a glowy green brooch-thing on his chest. Grinning at him like he’d finally cracked and saying, “Shoot me.”

The scientist with the glasses and the ponytail muttered, “Do us all a favour.”

John preferred to put on his most cautious expression and say, “Look. Dr. McKay. We’re all a little tense here but suicide by military isn’t really the way to go.”

McKay had done his compressed lips, eye roll, nod sideways, humourless smile routine, and then snapped, “I’m not trying to die, Major. It’s for science.”

“Oh,” John said, wondering whether he was insane or if this was yet another weird SGC thing, “If it’s for _science_ , that makes it okay.”

“Exactly! Thank you. Now, if you’ll just take that gun I see there on your- what do you call it, a belt?”

“Holster,” John offered.

“Whatever. Take it out. Point it at me. And shoot. Don’t worry, you can’t hurt me.”

John gave up. “McKay, what the hell are you talking about?”

At which point, Rodney grinned like a maniac, stuck his chest out like a pigeon, pointed to the brooch-thing and said, “It’s a personal shield. I’m 99.2 percent certain I’ll be fine no matter what you do to me.”

“99.2 percent?”

“Ah, yes. Think of it as very, very sure with a marginal amount of uncertainty over the limits of this device. For example, would I be able to withstand a bomb explosion? A nuclear holocaust? A biochemical attack? A...”

John shot him. In the leg, since he didn’t want to make a habit of shooting people. The marines were still upset about Sumner.

The bullet ricocheted off a glowy green haze around McKay’s thigh and broke a laptop and lodged in a wall. A Japanese woman shrieked. Scientists threw themselves behind the counters and soldiers burst in with guns raised, and Rodney just stood there yelping, “Ha! I knew it! I’m invincible!”

Which was pretty funny, once John persuaded the soldiers that he wasn’t trying to kill the scientists.

Besides, he figured it was a good team building exercise. Most of those meant either falling backwards at a team mate or trusting that they wouldn’t steal your last chocolate bar when you were asleep.

He was reasonably sure Rodney would steal his chocolate. And his coffee. And possibly his sanity. But throwing Rodney McKay off a balcony in the gate room turned out to be the most fun he’d had in a while.

The look on Weir’s face was priceless. The look on Grodin’s when he tried to punch Rodney was even better. Finding out Rodney couldn’t eat or drink or take the thing off- not so much.

But it turned out okay. They had other problems anyway. The energy cloud creature and the gate and possibly being cooked alive, and John looked down at Jinto first, then Ford, and later Rodney, and figured out that somewhere along the line seeing them hurt made him mad. And it wasn’t like Sumner. He _liked_ these people.

Wanted to protect them.

Not that he’d say anything. Not that he’d point out it was anything, God help him, like Mitch and Dex all over again. And if he couldn’t remember what it was like to see friends die, he’d eat his damn book.

So he cut a deal with himself. He’d gotten involved, like an idiot, and things were personal, fine, and he cared, okay, but he wasn’t going to trust these people. Not an inch. He was going to do his job, and he’d make the sacrifices that had to be made, but hell if he was going to let them get too close.

He wondered at the time if he’d believe himself if he said it often enough.

He didn’t think so.

It didn’t happen that way either. When had it ever?

“I trust you to do the right thing, John,” Elizabeth said.

And damn. John respected Elizabeth far more he wanted to. He liked her more than he wanted to. Not in that way, ‘cause that, sadly, was kind of impossible for him. Not that he didn’t – with women – but there was something about Elizabeth that didn’t quite make it to the ‘romance’ category.

Probably because he knew it would be an even worse idea than landing up in Atlantis in the first place. Bad enough they were stuck there, but if he and she tried anything, and if they ended up falling apart, which he was reasonably sure would happen because it always did, then he could hardly avoid the embarrassment of saying, “Yes, Elizabeth”, “No, Elizabeth”, “I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that so I can go do the right thing, now, Elizabeth”.

Still, that would probably have gone better than Rodney ‘I Blew Up Five-Sixths of a Solar System’ McKay.

John was pissed about that for months.

Mostly, he was pissed because he wasn’t actually angry with Rodney. He was angry with himself. For getting suckered in like that. For not trusting every last sign that said ‘danger’ and ‘unstable’ and ‘didn’t you ever hear the word hubris in High School English’.

But Rodney was so contrite. And so worried that John wouldn’t be friends any more. Worse, wouldn’t trust him. And John was hardly going to say he’d made a promise to himself not to do that anyway; it had nothing to do with Rodney or Doranda.

But it was too late now. John decided to stop kidding himself. He’d gone from a chopper pilot with no clearance to involved, personally invested, caring, and now trusting, and Rodney was _sorry_ about the Doranda thing. He was allowed to be. Didn’t mean John would accept Rodney’s hare-brained arrogance any easier next time but he’d been there himself.

Unlike the time with Lyle, Rodney hadn’t gotten John killed.

John wasn’t sure if it was luck or if he’d just been more determined to drag Rodney away from the self-destruction than Lyle had.

Which was insane. Guilt-ridden. No use blaming Lyle for what happened. Lyle had tried to say something but John hadn’t listened. Had thought he knew best after five years of not getting shot down, of watching other people bleed and die in the back of his chopper. Five years of getting jaded and, honestly, less careful.

Jaded was one thing the Pegasus Galaxy made sure he never was.

By the time he’d seen Ford turn from sunny kid to unstable psycho, seen Ronon turn up like a one-man army, by the time he’d found out that the deal with Teyla wasn’t going to turn out like all those Star Trek episodes because she liked her own people, her own culture, even if she’d made Atlantis her mission, he was beginning to suspect he’d never see the next twist coming.

Hell, he was allowed. He’d almost died twice. He’d almost turned into a bug once. He’d shared harmony with an Ascended woman who really had been incredibly hot and _nice_ , and he’d taken down a sixty-four man Genii invasion force. All by himself. Didn’t even count the number of times he’d flown suicide missions or confronted Wraith or been two seconds away from being brained with a big rock by yet another dirt-poor, hostile tribe.

So he was allowed to feel tense, and tired, and a whole lot angrier than when he started. What he had problems with was the fact that he was also now more involved, more personally invested, cared more for his team. And in connection to his team all the other people in Atlantis who pulled together and made things work. Even that girl in the cafeteria who smiled at him when she slopped whatever the red or white stuff was onto his tray every day.

But that was the one thing he really promised himself. He was not going to fall in love on Atlantis. He refused to.

Not after the almost-thing with Elizabeth and then losing her. He’d learned enough from Nancy and he’d learned from Lyle, and then he’d been forcibly reminded that worse things could happen to someone he cared about than just the relationship falling apart. Death was always a given on the expedition. Everybody knew that. Carson and Keller and all the rest of the doctors did their best. The soldiers got so much practice at first aid they could have done triage. But death still happened. People still died. And John learned to look the other way when his people broke down and cried beside beds they weren’t supposed to be allowed near.

Learned to look even more pointedly in the opposite direction when some of the people weren’t always compatible with military regulations. Lorne and that little English Sergeant. Lieutenant Douglas Murphy and Captain Sarah Edwards.

And then there were the others. Only happened to him once, thank God. The little anthropologist who turned up at the bedside of Sergeant Soto. John simply walked away that time. Not because there was anything particularly dramatic about it. The scientist was pretty composed, and Sergeant Soto was unconscious. But both were clearly close, and both were clearly male, and John really, really didn’t need to know.

Also didn’t need to know about Vega, but she’d kind of never said a word to him, so he hadn’t had to do anything about it.

Not that he would.

Not that he could afford to.

He thought he’d learned after Lyle. Impulses and insubordination and stupid crushes were things he’d thought he’d outgrown.

It didn’t work that way. Not that he was in love. He’d promised himself not to fall in love.

Was kind of hard to remember that when Rodney was clattering down hallways towards his room at dead of night, yelling his name at the top of his lungs. Not like a million other people couldn’t do it and have it mean something totally different. Totally platonic. And John kept reminding himself that Rodney was supposed to be a totally platonic subject.

But then again, he wasn’t even meant to be there, in the Pegasus Galaxy. He’d flipped a coin and called heads for going every time, and somehow he’d deluded himself into believing he needed to go anyway. He needed to be there. He needed to sit there on the pier, drinking beer with Rodney and refusing to say goodbye. Because Rodney had turned into the last person John could say goodbye to.

Had maybe let it show that night but Rodney wasn’t thinking straight. Was too wrapped up in his own thoughts and his own pain and his own needs to see John’s face in the dark, so it was better that way. Because, as John had figured out, there were worse things that could happen to the person he loved than just death.

Rodney McKay dead was a mind-boggling thought. Worse was watching him lose himself. Worst was watching him fall in love with somebody else. Torture was having to be happy for him.

But there was an upside. The upside was knowing Torren’s second name was ‘John’. It was knowing that his team was alive, that the people he cared about were alive, that he was alive. It was knowing that he’d met people he’d protect with his life. Not because he had to, but because he wanted to. It was knowing that he’d avenge all the people he’d had to fail. And knowing that he hadn’t failed as many as he’d thought he would, way back when Ford was explaining what a gate team was.

It was knowing that at the end of it, he’d proved himself and still got to wake up in the morning.

And who knew, he thought, staring at the Golden Gate Bridge through Atlantis’ cloak, maybe there were other promises he’d made that would become obsolete. Though the one about never having affairs with fellow officers was one he didn’t envision breaking.

Even if Colonel Mitchell was kind of hot.


End file.
